How dumping cripples industries

A Kaduna-based entrepreneur who operates a business centre, Alhaji Aminu Ahmad Burga Azare, says that in the 1980s, a brand new Minolta photocopier made in Japan, was sold at four thousand to fourteen thousand naira. While  100 sheets of photo-copy Paper were sold at two naira fifty kobo only. But a brand new machine is […]

A Kaduna-based entrepreneur who operates a business centre, Alhaji Aminu Ahmad Burga Azare, says that in the 1980s, a brand new Minolta photocopier made in Japan, was sold at four thousand to fourteen thousand naira. While  100 sheets of photo-copy Paper were sold at two naira fifty kobo only.
But a brand new machine is expensive and costs between eight hundred thousand to over one million naira. He then queried how can a business centre operator make profit? He said that is why they have all resorted to buying fairly used or what economists call junk-goods. He said a second hand photocopier is now bought at the cost of eighty thousand naira, while a new one costs eight hundred thousand naira.
According to him, Panasonic Machines are small, made in Japan by the former National Company and can be bought at the rate of 300,000 naira now.
He disclosed that many business centres are now using fairly used Sharp or Minolta machines, which cost 80,000  naira to make ends meet.  
He said even if the economist said Nigeria is a dumping ground, how can Nigeria move without the fake generators in the market?
He asserted hilariously that if Nigerians will have “dumped” regular supply of electricity, they will live better.
It is on record that many Nigerian companies have transferred their production base to neighbouring countries like Ghana, where they have comparative advantage, as electricity is in constant supply in those areas.
An importer of vehicles, especially used cars, Alhaji Salisu Abdullahi who is the Managing Director of Continental Motors Nigeria limited, on Sultan Road Kaduna, said it is lack of foresight for the government to say that a new company will come and manufacture cars in Nigeria. Most of the populace cannot afford it, as the “Tokunbo” or used cars is the vogue all over Nigeria due to the hyper-inflationary trend of the naira by many successive governments.
He asked how the age-old Peugeot assembling plant in Kaduna is faring, talk-less of a new one. There are many other comatose plants like volkswagen cars, Leyland trucks in Lagos, Fiat in Kano, Steyr in Bauchi, amongst others, which have since left for their respective countries.
Almost all the trucks, namely: DAF, Leyland, MAN-Diesel, among others, plying the Nigerian Roads with either oil, goods or whatsoever, and Cars whether Jeeps or commercial taxis, are dumped as the new ones, cannot be easily bought.
You don’t need an economist to know that when a company closes its doors, everybody feels the pain be it the government which is losing in tax revenue, the suppliers of diesel and the community where the industry was localized, staff and the auxiliary in such services. While the new community benefits fully from the loss incurred from that of the former community.
Alhaji Salisu Abdullahi queried how much is the salary of a Nigerian worker, for him to be able to afford a brand new car. He said the cheapest new cars are chinese models which are not as durable as European or Japanese brands, and are beyond the reach of many as they are up to a million per piece. He therefore called on the government to provide electricity first, before it talks of having a sustained economy, instead of relying heavily on dumping of almost everything.
A Chief lecturer and Managing Director of Kaduna Polytechnic (Kadpoly Consult) Limited Alhaji Abubakar Danasabe Umar, said to a lay man dumping is the situation whereby an individual or a society or a country accepts whatever goods or services is fed to that country, society or an individual, irrespective of the quality, to satisfy the needs of the country amongst others. In most cases the recipient country had no alternative than to accept that.
He said dumping is always detrimental to the country where the items are dumped.  
He added that the African Development Initiative (ADI) sponsored farmers to produce cotton in West Africa and take it to the US. But we don’t have functional textiles.
He retorted that  Funtua, Kano, Kaduna, Gusau, are good producers of cotton, but our textiles are dead. Laying  off  of  textile personnel has led to crimes, while a hungry man prefers to eat  cassava and die than not to eat at all. If the country is bent on growth and development, it can compete favorably.  
The management consultant however questioned the recent statement by the Finance Minister Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala that: “How did she define economic development, while the country is a dumping ground?

What you need to see on the street is not what you see on paper. Go round and see on the average, the type of taxis, buses, private cars plying the roads.
But in a whole country like Nigeria, what you get are youths ready-for-hire to perpetrate any act. Even the Sure-P buses, cars and tricycles are robustly inadequate. It is not felt at the grassroot.
What is the continuing development of the Abuja and Kano and few other cities with roads, infrastructure while most of the cities are retrogressing in power, infrastructure, security, amongst many others, he retort.  
He said Minister Okonjo-Iweala should know that it does not take a statistician to know whether there is growth or development in a city or not. What she is saying is grossly misleading to Nigerians.
It is sad that Nigeria has many good policies, but the implementation is the problem as retrogression instead of progression in the bane. “No power, no development” to service Big, Medium, micro and Nano industries.  
Nigerians would not mind if ‘dump’ electricity would be made available for the industries to work well, and even employ the teeming youths on the street.
However, the famous Kaduna Industrial area which comprises  many factories and textiles has now become a ghost of itself, as some do not even have a security guard to oversee the decaying machines.
The importation of textile materials like clothes and clothing materials has crippled the textiles. One of the captains of industry in Nigeria and Deputy Managing Director of a textile in Kaduna Senator Walid Jibrin, could not be reached for comments on the grant worth billions of naira to revive the textile sector. However, it was alleged that the closure of these companies due to dumping has increased the number of crimes in the country, and the scourge sadly is on the increase, but for how long, only time will tell.